Kevin Williams, The Daily Record Newswire
When the federal government partially shut down last month, one of the casualties was the free flow of data from the National Climatic Data Center.
So what is a forensic meteorologist to do in such circumstances?
In our case, we have prepared for such a contingency through the years by archiving voluminous data and having back-up Internet portals that can provide much of the same data available as from the U.S. government. As a result, we were still able to provide most of our clients with the forensic services that they have come to expect.
That being said, there were no certification services available given that the government workers that handle such requests were furloughed. And some of the “alpha numeric” data sets dealing with National Weather Service statements, etc., were not available.
Of course, when asked to take on a case, we typically are looking to reconstruct the weather for a day or a series of days from a year or a few years ago. The database for most American cities allows us to analyze conditions with some precision back over a hundred years.
But there are also ways to examine the weather from the more distant past in the absence of official records. Such examinations help us understand how the climate changes.
One method to compensate for the dearth of weather records going back hundreds and even thousands of years utilizes “weather proxies.” These can include paintings, clothing fragments, personal diaries and even graveyards.
For example, from about 1645 to 1850, the Earth was plunged into what is known as “The Little Ice Age.” During this time, residents of the northeastern United States and much of Europe suffered through long and brutally cold winters.
Some of what we know about the Little Ice Age was garnered from records of French wineries that show meager harvests. Other information came from accounts of Revolutionary War cannons being transported over a frozen Long Island Sound. Even paintings from Rembrandt prove helpful as they depict frozen Dutch canals that were not known to have frozen.
In another example, we know that it was rather warm a thousand years ago, prior to the Little Ice Age. We know that from the work of scientists who studied the condition of the graves and the remains of the Norse settlers of Greenland. What they have shown is that once upon a time, Greenland was green— lush with vegetation. Then, about 500 years ago, the climate cooled to the point that crops failed and the Norse settlers perished.
And there are also, of course, more objective means to gauge the weather of the distant past. These methods include carbon dating and ice core analysis, perhaps the subject of a future column.
I have yet to receive a forensic request for weather analysis prior to the 20th century and I am not anticipating one anytime soon. But I will be ready if one ever comes in. And I will also again be ready the next time the government shuts down.
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Kevin Williams is president of weather-track.com.
